


never really ever felt this type of vulnerable

by iittaliia



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Bickering, Canon Compliant, Character Death Fix, Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, First Kiss, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-Canon Fix-It, Stanley Uris Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:35:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27338023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iittaliia/pseuds/iittaliia
Summary: Silence settles over them as they look over at their friends. Richie can see Mike dive underwater and a moment later Bill yells and accidentally splashes water at disgruntled Eddie who starts screaming. Richie can make out the wordsstab woundandcholera, and he feels somuchthat he has to close his eyes for a moment, and doesn’t even realize he’s talking before the words have already left his lips.”I’m scared.””I know.”//Or, Richie figures out that some advice is worth listening to.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 7
Kudos: 177





	never really ever felt this type of vulnerable

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back at it! This is my fifth IT fic and I still have never read the book, watched the miniseries or more than glimpses from the new films. I was picturing them as they were in chapter two, but characterization comes from other fics - _but_ I think if I'd be way off with their personalities someone would have told me by now.
> 
> I do not know how the quarry looks properly, and I absolutely refuse to watch any scenes from it because of obvious, grief related reasons, but for the purpose of this story it's more like a lake with a shore.

”Are you ever going to tell him?”

Richie is not surprised by the question, was expecting it, in fact, but it still throws him off slightly because he was not expecting it here, at the Quarry mere hours after escaping from certain death. He takes a deep breath and holds it in as he stares at the water and the slightly blurry figures splashing around in it. His lenses are cracked but he can still make out who’s who, is pretty sure that now after getting them back he would be able to point out any one of them from a line up - even if he would end up blind from continuing to ignore his regular check ups with his optometrist.

He enjoys the burn in his lungs a moment longer before letting the breath out and contemplating his answer. The immediate response is the three d’s (ha, d’s) that he was used to - deny, deflect and distract. But he abandons those thoughts almost as quickly as they come, not only because he knew it would be absolutely pointless and he would get called out _immediately_ , but also because apparently being on the verge of death for multiple hours had given him a new perspective in life.

He didn’t want to deny, deflect, or distract, didn’t want to say ’ _I don’t know what you’re talking about_ ’ or ’ _It’s not what you think_ ’ or ’ _I’m going to tell him how many times I pissed in that water as a child and watch him freak out, that’s what I’m going to tell him_ ’.

”No”, Richie finally says and hugs his knees closer to his chest. He’d come out of water to warm himself up in the sunlight, but the universe clearly hates him because the sun had immediately disappeared behind clouds when Richie’d gotten to shore. His jeans are wet but it’s no different from the rest of him, so it doesn’t really matter.

”And may I ask why?”

”You may not, but that didn’t seem to stop you from asking anyway”, Richie points out, and he can _feel_ the eye roll without even seeing it.

They are quiet for a moment and Richie enjoys listening to his friends laughter echo around the water. Bev’s giggles are like music to his ears and he can clearly picture the lovesick way Ben is looking at her.

An exasperated ”You’re an idiot” interrupts his thoughts, and he turns to his left with a raised eyebrow.

”Stanley, you’ve known me since we were _five._ I have absolutely never been anything but an idiot this whole time and you know it.”

Stan makes a weird face and scrunches his nose. ”I missed quite a big chuck of your life, I’d hoped you might have acquired some braincells during my absence. Sadly I was clearly mistaken.”

”Well, that sounds like a you problem, not a me problem”, Richie grins and turns to look back at the water. He can see one smaller figure waving his hands around to what looks like amused Mike, but before Richie can catch what Mike’s done to deserve a Kaspbrak patented talking to, Bill shrieks for who knows what reason.

”No, this is definitely a you problem”, Stan says sternly, clearly not willing to let the conversation drop. ”And it’s not even a _problem_ if you would just put on your big boy pants and _talk_ _to_ _him_.”

”That’s an interesting suggestion, Staniel the Spaniel, but here’s a counteroffer - I will _not_ do that.”

Stan sighs and turns his whole body to face Richie now. Richie notes that while he looks like a big, wet, hairy animal, Stan is somehow able to pull off the whole ’ _I just jumped into a body of water with my clothes on_ ’-look. He is about to tell Stan how annoying and unfair that is, and maybe flirt a little just to make the other man roll his eyes again, but decides against it as Stan gives him a look that says _beep_ _beep_ loud and clear.

”Listen, Richie, obviously I can’t tell you what to do or how to live your life. I’ve tried doing that who knows _how_ many times before realizing you’d rather eat poisonous berries than take unsolicited advice.” Richie shudders at the memory. He’d thrown up for six hours. ”That being said, I have to tell you that _not_ telling him would be the stupidest and most self-destructing thing you could possibly do. Not only because you are denying yourself the opportunity to be _happy_ , which is something that you deserve, _obviously_ , but you’re also denying it from _Eddie_.”

Richie closes his eyes briefly at the mention of Eddie’s name, because for some stupid reason it makes the whole conversation more real. So far there was still the options for the three d’s, to pretend like it was all a big misunderstanding and that they were talking about two completely separate things, but he could no longer do that. Richie sighs and turns to look at Eddie who is now yapping away at Ben and Bev, and Richie can hear ”- _do you know how fucking unsanitary it is to kiss underwater_ -” before he tunes it back out.

”I’m not denying him anything”, he says, sounding defensive, and Stan lets out a frustrated noise.

”But you _are_. He doesn’t know, and he will not know unless you tell him, because he’s too fucking busy trying to keep _you_ from noticing _him_ that he’s not noticing _you_.”

Richie furrows his brow and tries to disentangle Stan’s words so they make sense, but before he’s quite ready Stan carries on. ”And I _know_ you’re going to use some stupid excuse like his marriage - which is _clearly_ over the minute he gets cell reception - as your reason for not saying anything, but look at Ben and Beverly.”

”It’s not the same”, Richie argues, but it sounds weak to his own ears too.

”And how is it not?” Stan counters back immediately and Richie groans.

”It just _isn’t_ , okay? Let’s say for arguments sake that he’s going to divorce his mom wife. He will have to reorganize his whole life again, try to figure himself out, who he is as a person outside the marriage and everything that came with it. I don’t fit in that picture, I’d just be an extra package to deal with on top of his own, and that’s not fair.”

”Don’t you think that’s his choice to make?” Stan points out. ”I’m going to entertain this insane reality that you seem to have created in which you would be something he - or _we_ , the Losers, for that matter - just have to deal with. Don’t you think he should be the one making that decision, not you? Don’t you think that after having been ripped from most of the decisions in his life he should be the one deciding who he wants to keep in his life an in what capacity, after getting all the necessary information?”

Stan falls silent after that, apparently deciding he’s made his point and leaves Richie to think it over. And Richie does, because even if he hates to admit it Stan had hit the nail right on the head.

While the whole ’ _being_ _married_ ’ -thing was definitely part of his reluctance to say anything, Richie’s morals were quite flimsy so he wasn’t above making advances to married man. The issue wasn’t even sexuality, because even though Richie didn’t know Eddie’s he had enough trust and faith in him not to turn out like Bowers and start throwing slurs around.

No, the issue was Richie not wanting to burden Eddie with it. He doesn’t want Eddie to have to give him an apologetic, yet pitiful smile while saying ’ _sorry, I just don’t feel that way about you_ ’. He doesn’t want Eddie to have to start rethinking their relationship and everything that they’ve done together and try to figure out when exactly he’d given Richie the impression that there was something between them. He doesn’t want Eddie to figure out that it’s just _him_ , just who he is as a person, that made Richie feel this way. He doesn’t want Eddie to start changing his behavior around Richie in order to bare his feelings, in order to make it somehow easier while simultaneously twisting the knife.

And it’s stupid, it really is, because obviously Richie doesn’t know if that would happen, but just the idea is enough to steer him away from confessing. Eddie’s been through enough, has survived enough, and he doesn’t deserve to have to deal with all the extra stress and anxiety that Richie opening his damn mouth would bring.

 _But_. There’s always a but. And he wants to hate Stan for pointing it out, but even more so he wants to kick himself for not realizing it himself.

If he doesn’t tell Eddie, if he doesn’t let him make his own decisions, his own choices, is he any better than Sonia - or, presumably, Myra too?

Richie groans again. ”I hate it when you make sense. Stop making sense.”

Stan lets out a surprised laugh and knocks his wet shoulder against Richie’s. ”Well, someone has to.”

Silence settles over them again as they look over at their friends. Richie can see Mike dive underwater and a moment later Bill yells and accidentally splashes water at disgruntled Eddie who starts yelling. Richie can make out the words _stab_ _wound_ and _cholera_ , and he feels so _much_ that he has to close his eyes for a moment, and doesn’t even realize he’s talking before the words have already left his lips.

”I’m scared.”

”I know.”

Richie appreciates that Stan understands not to make fun of him and is briefly filled with heartache over the fact that he didn’t get to have Stan in his life for _decades_. He didn’t get to workshop his jokes on him, didn’t get to watch his and Patty’s relationship evolve, didn’t get to make fun of him and be made fun of _by_ him. Richie decides he will never go a day without telling Stan - and the rest of the Losers, for that matter - how much he loves and appreciates them all.

But one in particular.

”What if he starts to hate me?” Richie asks, and hates how small his voice sounds.

”Richie”, Stan replies sternly, and waits for Richie to look at him before rolling his eyes exasperatedly like Richie is being stupid on purpose. ”He would never.”

”You don’t know that”, Richie points out, more so just for the sake of arguing because honestly he _knows_ Eddie wouldn’t hate him, is probably not even capable to feel such emotion truly. Child murdering space clowns excluded.

”Hey, Eddie?” Stan suddenly yells, and Richie turns to look over at the water just in time to see Eddie turn around and notice them.

”What - are you guys _still_ just sitting there? I thought you were going to just sit for a minute, what the _fuck_ am _I_ still doing in this filthy ass water if we’re not even all here? I thought this was supposed to be some fucking group bonding ritual! I can’t fucking -”

Richie’s heart is doing weird things and it must all show on his face because Stan mutters something that sounds a lot like ’ _you’re so gone it’s ridiculous_ ’.

”Could you ever hate Richie?” Stan yells again, completely ignoring Eddie’s rant and cutting him off mid-sentence.

”I already do”, Eddie shoots back without missing a beat and sounds somehow both confused and pissed off by the conversation, and Richie can’t help the snort that leaves his mouth.

”Oh, my bad, I thought we all loved each other”, Stan says conversationally.

”Well, yeah, fucking _obviously_ I love him”, Eddie replies like it’s the most obvious thing. His voice sounds louder now, and Richie’s not sure if it’s because everyone else had gotten really quiet suddenly or if it’s because he said it with more force. ”That doesn’t mean I can’t also hate him, it’s _Richie_ , he’s fucking infuriating”.

”I’m right here”, Richie mumbles out a laugh, not loud enough for Eddie to hear because he doesn’t want the others to hear how fucking lovesick he sounds.

”That’s fair”, Stan grins his reply and turns to give Richie his full attention again with a raised eyebrow that says ’ _I told you_ ’.

Richie doesn’t feel so scared anymore. ’ _Fucking obviously I love him_ ’ rings in his mind on repeat, and even if it’s not quite the same, it’s close enough. It gives him hope. Maybe he will tell him - no, he _will_ tell him. He knows it now with certainty, he just needs a sign from the universe to show him when the perfect moment is.

Suddenly Richie feels the sunlight hit his back and that’s that.

”Hey, Eddie?”

”Fucking _what_ , you asshole who talked me into jumping here in the first place and then just went to the fucking shore, what do you want?”

”I’m in love with you.”

”Oh.”

Richie really wishes his eyesight wasn’t so shit and his classes weren’t so blurry and cracked, because he’s really not able to tell what Eddie’s face is doing from so far away. What he _can_ see is that after a beat Eddie starts to make his way towards them.

Richie is not sure if he should say something more, maybe explain himself , but decides against it because there’s not really need to elaborate. He’s in love with Eddie. Sky is blue, water is wet, Pennywise is dead and Eddie is the love of Richie’s life.

Eddie, who is suddenly very close to the shore and announcing ”Well I said it first.”

Richie blinks, frowns and blinks again. ”It’s not a competition, but also no you didn’t”, he replies, because he’s pretty sure he would remember that.

”Yes I did, fucking five minutes ago dipshit”, Eddie disagrees immediately and Richie watches him get out of the water.

”No, first of all you were talking to Stan, not me, and second of all you just said you love me, not that you’re -”

”Well I _meant_ it like that, so I said it first!” Eddie argues, and something warm and is filling Richie’s chest and he can’t keep the giddiness out of his voice as he says ”It doesn’t count, I win!

”You said it wasn’t a competition!” Eddie yells and swats at Richie’s knee. Richie straightens his legs out obediently and smirks.

”It’s ever only not a competition if I lose baby.”

”I fucking _hate_ you”, Eddie groans and shoots Richie an annoyed look that doesn’t really hold up, since he’s simultaneously settling himself down on Richie’s lap. Richie is pretty sure he is dreaming.

”Ooh lovely, I keep on winning because you _still_ haven’t said it”, he points out with a raised brow. It’s a joke, mostly, because it’s what he does, but Eddie’s face gets serious and he goes in for the kill.

”Richie. I’m in love with you”, he declares in a way a doctor might tell a patient they have gonorrhea. Richie can’t breathe. ” _Also_ , I’m going to break your fucking kneecaps.”

Stan snorts from somewhere on their left, but Richie pays him absolutely no mind as he looks at Eddie who looks smug like he’s won the argument, and that just won’t do.

”Shouldn’t be too difficult since I’m like a head taller than you, my knees are located by your waist.”

”I’m average height, you fucking -” Eddie shrieks, but Richie cuts him off the way he’s wanted to cut Eddie off since they were thirteen - by kissing him.

He expects to take Eddie off by surprise, but the moment their lips touch Richie can feel hands come up to hold his face as Eddie kisses him back like their lives depend on it. Richie lets out a whine that he will deny to his dying days, and wraps his arms around Eddie’s waist. Eddie makes pleased noise against Richie’s mouth and kisses him some more, bites his lower lip ever so slightly before licking into his mouth.

” _Eddie_ ”, Richie whimpers out accidentally because the only thoughts in his mind is _Eddie Eddie Eddie_ , and Eddie shushes him gently before kissing him again once, twice, three times, before leaning back slightly to lock their eyes together.

”I love you, and I want to do that again as soon as possible, but I also have a hole in my face that needs tending to before it gets infected, and I do _not_ want it to get infected because I need time to research who do I want as my doctor in LA, and I will not have time for that with an infection” he says very matter-of-factly.

Richie’s mind short-circuits as he tries to form a coherent sentence that tells Eddie that he will personally pay for a relocation for all of Eddie’s doctors if that meant he would come to LA with him. He want to offer to move to New York instead, or fucking Bahamas for all he cares, as long as it’s with Eddie, but what comes out is ”I would be more than happy to tend to your holes, Eds”.

There is a loud groan and laughter from next to them, and Richie is surprised to note that all of their friends have gotten out of the water.

”This man, Eddie, _really_?” Stan, the one who groaned, asks. ”He’s the one?” Richie would be offended if it wasn’t for the way Stan’s eyes gleam and he is clearly holding back a smile.

”Yep”, Eddie just replies easily, popping the p. ”He’s the one”, he says, smiles, and against his earlier words, leans in to kiss Richie again.

**Author's Note:**

> That's that! Thank you for reading, please feel free to leave kudos, comments and prompts if you'd like, and remember to check out my other Reddie fics too! 
> 
> I wrote this one at three am in one sitting, and I'm actually quite proud of how it turned out considering those circumstances. ALSO has anyone realized where I get my titles from? I do like to think I'm quite clever with what I listen to for inspiration.


End file.
